Saturday, April 7, 2012

In the News!

This is just a little story to let you in on the kind of things that go through my head on a fairly regular basis.Sometimes it’s not pretty in there. This one might not be for everyone.

You were warned.

Last night my mother and I saw a news item on television. The headline was “Shrewsbury Man Accused of Killing Wife.”

The voice-over was a reporter who sounded so happy to be covering the story it was downright creepy. He gave his warning about the gruesomeness of the story, but finished the warning with the word ‘cannibalism’ delivered in tones that said he could not believe his luck.

You may have seen the story on the news. I’ll spare you the details here, but I’ll nutshell the pertinent points for you.

A Cambodian man went to his parent’s apartment to find that his 79 year old father had killed and partially dismembered his 73 year old wife, and had been chewing on the limbs he had removed. The story was told as they rolled video of the accused murderer in court. Now, for those of you who didn’t see the video, I can tell you that this is not an ancient looking man. This is no George Takei, who at 74 looks like he could kick my butt in a fight, even if I fought dirty. This man is (according to the police report) 5’2” tall, weighing in at 75 lbs. The whole time he’s in the box there is a bailiff there holding him up because he’s too frail to remain standing for long enough to have the charges read out. He looks confused, and keeps blinking; not little quick blinks, but long, squeezing his eyes shut for a second or two blinks, like he’s trying to wake from a bad dream, or maybe make this world go away and get back to his happy place. Or he was just swimming in a pool with too much chlorine in the water. Who knows.

The voice-over reports that the man may be suffering from advancing dementia and possibly Alzheimer’s.

What a surprise.

Yes, this is a completely terrible story, but there is a bright little twist at the end.

The old man apparently muttered something to his son about it being ‘self-defense.’

Seriously?

My mother, upon hearing that, said “Oh, sure, it was self defense! What’s he going to say? ‘Oh, she attacked me, so I had to eat her limbs?’”